Ecole d'Humanité

The Ecole d'Humanité is an international boarding school, located in the Canton of Bern, Switzerland. It was founded in 1934 by Paul Geheeb and his wife Edith Geheeb Cassirer. In 1910, Geheeb had founded a similar school, the Odenwaldschule, in his native Germany, but he fled to Switzerland to found the new school after the NSDAP came to power.[1]

Ecole d'Humanité
Address
Haupthaus

Hasliberg, Goldern

Switzerland
Information
TypePrivate, Swiss International Boarding School
Motto"Deviens qui tu es", "Become who you are"
Established1934
AuthorizerFederation of Swiss Private Schools / Cognia / SSA
Faculty~50
GenderCo-educational
Enrollment~130
Student to teacher ratio1 : 5
Color(s)Black and Gold
Song"Das Lied von der Moldau" by Bertolt Brecht
MascotThe Ecole Eagle
EndowmentUndisclosed
Annual tuitionThe school's tuition varies depending on different factors, such as student needs and extra curricular pursuits, to anywhere up to CHF 100,000 ($102,989)
Websitehttp://www.ecole.ch
The Ecole d'Humanité campus during the winter term. Students have access to pistes and ski throughout the winter months.

The Ecole d'Humanité was first located in Versoix, Geneva before Geheeb moved it to its present location on the Hasliberg in 1946. The school places a heavy emphasis on ending academic classes by noon and dedicating the afternoons to leisure pursuits with the heaviest emphasis on hiking and skiing. In 1956, Natalie Lüthi-Peterson, an American academic and a protege of Geheeb, took charge of the Ecole's American Program, allowing students to prepare for exams needed for entry into elite American and British universities while studying in Switzerland.[2] Following the death of Paul Geheeb in 1961, directorship of the school passed to Natalie and her Swiss husband Armin Lüthi, together they oversaw operations at the school until 1993.[3]

Accreditation

Federation of Swiss Private Schools "SFPS"
The school's "Ottoman Arch" library

The Ecole d'Humanité is a member of the SFPS, colloquially known as "Swiss Schools", a prestigious union of the best boarding schools and private education institutions in Switzerland and the world. SFPS counts boarding schools such as Insitut Le Rosey, Institut Montana Zugerberg, Brillantmont, Leysin, Aiglon, Lyceum Alpinium Zuoz and Institut Auf Dem Rosenberg amongst its ranks.[4]

Cognia and SSA

Along with the SFPS, the Ecole d'Humanité is also certified by Cognia, a high-ranking international school accreditor which offers its services to other renowned Swiss boarding schools such as Institut auf dem Rosenberg and Surval Montreux.[5] The school also has Swiss permits to conduct extreme sports and expeditions from SSA.

The iconic Eberhard Berent House at Night, used by students as a learning centre
The Ecole campus in summer, nestled beneath the Eiger
Ecole students enjoy the weekly "Ski Day", where morning courses are replaced with skiing with friends, as well as organised snow-trekking and relaxing on piste.

Overview

Academics

The Ecole is consistently ranked one of the best schools in Europe[6] this is largely because of the wide range of activities and opportunities students are given, from trips across the globe, to hikes on the Eiger trail, and a dedicated staff of ski instructors and sports advisors. Students at the Ecole do not receive grades in their classes, instead they receive highly personalised written reports/portfolios for each assignment and class they complete. Because of the school's bespoke, hands on curriculum and high Advanced Placement scores, students often go on to study at the world's most prestigious higher education institutions, including Oxford, Yale, Cambridge, The ETH, Brown, The University of Chicago, Dartmouth and NYU.[7]

Admissions

The Ecole prides itself on its small class sizes, as it only allows roughly 100-140 students to have the opportunity to study on its campus. The school also has an academic staff team of nearly 50, all of which have obtained doctorates, masters and degrees at prestigious higher education establishments, because of this, classrooms tend to have anywhere from 2-9 students in them. Smaller classroom sizes allow Ecole teachers to provide a highly personalised education to each student so that they can delve far deeper into an academic subject than they normally would.[8] Because of the school's available places and philosophy, admissions are very selective, with the Ecole only offering entry to students who they feel are an intellectual fit with the community and will take opportunities and their formative education into their own hands.[9]

Student life

Apart from Skiing and Hiking, one of the principal advantages of The Ecole's extracurricular program is that students are allowed to organise any activities or classes that they want. Because of this freedom students can engage in a variety of activities that include horse riding, tennis, sky diving, ice hockey, scuba diving, agriculture, botany, sailing, water-skiing, culinary arts and silversmithing as well as a number of important cultural events.[10] The school is also known for its annual Shakespeare and dance performances.[11]

Associations

Ecole Circle

Like many boarding schools in Switzerland, The Ecole d'Humanité has a club which offers membership to Ex-Ecolianers known as the "Ecole Circle". The EC is dedicated to hosting a number of dinners, conferences, and events throughout the year in the cities of Basel and Zurich. The association offers an opportunity for alumni to make prestigious connections[12] with its international network of members, who also organise independent EC events in their respective countries. The circle also offers food and accommodation to alumni travelling internationally, through a system that allows them to stay with other members who donated or volunteered their homes to the association.[13] Similar to the school itself, information on alumni is not released to the public and events can only be attended by former students and their friends or family.[14]

The Ecolianer Magazine

The Ecole also publishes a biannual magazine for students and alumni called "The Ecolianer", which discusses the school in relation to the political, social and economic changes occurring in the world. Every year "The Ecolianer" is assigned a dedicated international team to work on its content.[15]

Geheeb-Cassirer Foundation

The "Geheeb-Cassirer Foundation" or "EGCF", is a fund that was created in honour of the founders of the Ecole d'Humanité, Paul Geheeb and Edith Geheeb-Cassirer. The foundation provides scholarships to students from diverse "ethnic and economic"[16] backgrounds so that they can attend international boarding schools across Switzerland. For Ecole-specific scholarships the EGCF offers a scheme where "scholarships are awarded for one year... [then it is] the practice of the Ecole d'Humanité to continue to provide financial support to EGCF scholarship recipients for the entire time that they are at the Ecole, providing they remain in good academic and social standing".[17]

Tuition

Fees range from a base of 62,000 CHF (Approximately 63,000 USD) up to 100,000 CHF (102,988 USD), depending on the individual needs and routines of the student, without counting fees for excursions and other activities. Despite the significant fees, the school offers considerable scholarships to deserving students. These fees are also necessary to sustain the high number of dedicated staff who live on campus all year round.[18]

Campus

The Ecole d'Humanité is located in Canton Bern, within the village of Hasliberg-Goldern, near Grindelwald, Engelberg, Mürren and Gstaad. The campus's student housing makes up most of the residences in the village all built in the traditional Alpine Chalet style. The Ecole also has access to a number of specialised facilities in surrounding villages, such as climbing gyms and outdoor parkour courses. Because of its philosophy and location in the Bernese Oberland, the school emphasises the value of nature, sports and leisure activities.[19] Students are encouraged to ski, hike and explore, because of this the school has extensive access to local ski pistes and even has a custom slope built every year so that students may ski directly into the campus. The Ecole also has well equipped laboratories, music rooms, wood and blacksmithing workshops, a theatre/auditorium with professional lighting and sound as well as a farm.[20] Twice a year students will rigorously prepare to take week long trips where they hike across the peaks of the Swiss Alps and different parts of Europe, the school also offers a more advanced mountain biking, mountaineering and ski touring hike.[21]

Stiftung Ecole d'Humanité

The "Board for the Advancement of the Ecole d'Humanité" or "SEDH" is a tax exempt, non-profit foundation[22] tasked with providing exterior funds for the Ecole's needs and aims outside of its own endowment or tuition fees. The fund grosses roughly CHF 1,000,000 ($1,029,705) in donations every year and is directed by a board of Swiss corporate executives which include: the Ex-Director of Saviva AG; Walter Brandenberger, the Ex-Executive Director and Head of Business Support for UBS; Albert Gnand, the Owner of Gallin GmbH; Beatrice Gallin, and the Director of Fundraising for Caritas Luzern; Benno Breitenmoser.[23]

Alumni

Notable Alumni
Ecole students ski touring in Canton Bern

Since its founding, the Ecole d'Humanité has educated a host of influential figures and notable families ranging from Olympic athletes and prime ministers to European royalty. The school is very discreet and has a privacy policy which keeps it from releasing any information on current or past students, however, some known alumni include the following:

Associated Figures

See also

References
  1. Dennis Shirley. The Politics of Progressive Education: The Odenwaldschule in Nazi Germany. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1992. 171-185.
  2. In Memory of Armin and Natalie
  3. "DER SPIEGEL | Online-Nachrichten". www.spiegel.de. Retrieved 23 May 2020.
  4. "Schulen vergleichen - Verband Schweizerischer Privatschulen VSP". www.swiss-schools.ch. Retrieved 28 April 2020.
  5. "Accreditation & Certification". Cognia. Retrieved 23 May 2020.
  6. "The Best 49 Boarding Schools in Europe". Boarding Schools. Retrieved 28 April 2020.
  7. "International Boarding School Switzerland | College and University Counseling | Ecole d'Humanité". www.ecole.ch. Retrieved 28 April 2020.
  8. D'Aoust, Renée E. (2018). Gorham, Sarah (ed.). "Alpine Heart". Fourth Genre: Explorations in Nonfiction. 20 (1): 197–202. doi:10.14321/fourthgenre.20.1.0197. ISSN 1522-3868. JSTOR 10.14321/fourthgenre.20.1.0197. S2CID 201745006.
  9. Shirley, Dennis (1992). The Politics of Progressive Education: The Odenwaldschule in Nazi Germany. Cambridge Massachusetts, United States of America: Harvard University Press. pp. 1–30.
  10. "Ecole d'Humanité – Premier Boarding Schools". Retrieved 23 May 2020.
  11. "International Boarding School Switzerland | Afternoon Courses | Ecole d'Humanité". www.ecole.ch. Retrieved 13 May 2020.
  12. Singh, Rani (13 September 2011). Sonia Gandhi: An Extraordinary Life, An Indian Destiny. St. Martin's Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-230-34053-4.
  13. "EcoleBNB". ecolebnb.ecole.ch. Retrieved 23 May 2020.
  14. "International Boarding School | Ecole Circle | Ecole d'Humanité". www.alumni.ecole.ch. Retrieved 23 May 2020.
  15. Ecole d'humanité (2015). "The ecolianer: newsletter of the Ecole d'humanité". The Ecolianer. OCLC 173961163 – via Worldcat.
  16. "Edith Geheeb-Cassirer Foundation - GuideStar Profile". www.guidestar.org. Retrieved 23 May 2020.
  17. "Foundation Goals". GeheebCassirer.org. Retrieved 23 May 2020.
  18. "International Boarding School Switzerland | Tuition | Ecole d'Humanité". www.ecole.ch. Retrieved 28 April 2020.
  19. "International Boarding School Switzerland | How we learn | Ecole d'Humanité". www.ecole.ch. Retrieved 11 May 2020.
  20. "International schools in Switzerland: a guide for expats | Expatica". Expat Guide to Switzerland | Expatica. Retrieved 22 May 2020.
  21. "Ecole d'Humanité Profile (2020) | 6085 Hasliberg Goldern, Switzerland". Boarding School Review. Retrieved 22 May 2020.
  22. "International Boarding School | Tax Exemption | Ecole d'Humanité". stiftung.ecole.ch. Retrieved 23 May 2020.
  23. "International Boarding School | Annual Report | Ecole d'Humanité". stiftung.ecole.ch. Retrieved 23 May 2020.

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